Slashdot Mirror
McDonald's and Sony Offer Music Downloads
J ROC writes "CNet reports that McDonalds and Sony are teaming up to offer free music downloads to customers who buy a Big Mac Extra Value Meal. The offer, which begins on June 8, offers customers an access code to download one free song at Sony's Connect online music store. Hmmm, let's see, about 600 calories in a Big Mac, an average of 12 songs on a CD, so that's about 7200 calories you will need to consume in order to get an album's worth of music (and I'm not including the calories from the fries and softdrink). Does this offer also include a free gym membership?"
The free gym membership comes with the triple bypass.
Everything in moderation, even moderation.
No, especially moderation.
I thought McDonald's was supposed to start promoting it's more healthier meals now? What's the point of tying that to a Big Mac extra value meal? They should put it with their healthier stuff to spark up sales of that since that's where their business looks to be heading...
Hmmm.
... Is the two-all beef patties song. Imagine playin that while rockin' down the highway.
Yes! I listen to NYC Speedcore and do math at 3AM. I suggest you try it too.
I'd rather pay the 99 cents and get it off iTunes, besides... I don't touch anything with "special sauce".
Why not do that instead?
Clown. Hamburger. That combination alone is bizzare. Now we're supposed to think Clown+Hamburger+MP3 is sane?
Sony's Connect store is the one only offering the ATRAC3 format files, which is only compatible with Sony players.
I admit that iTunes is only offering DRM Protected AAC, which is almost as bad, but at least AAC has a pretty high quality. By comparison, ATRAC3 sounds like you're hearing the music through a tube. Not to mention that ATRAC3 has some of the worst DRM and restrictive software I've ever seen.. You have to check music into and out of your portable player device, I believe. It's just wacky as hell.
- Give a man a fire and he's warm for a day, but set him on fire and he's warm for the rest of his life.
Customer: I'll have a chocolate shake, Don Henley's Greatest Hits, and, ummmm, The Eagles Greatest Hits to go, please.
McD: You want Frey's with that?
Sigh, not _yet another_ incentive for kids to eat unhealthy garbage and get fat. McD's could get better kudos by only offering it with "healthy" things like salad.
But wait, they don't *do* healthy things.
$ mv *.sig >/dev/null
Before buying any more fast food, check out Fast Food Nation by Eric Schlosser. I'm reading it right now, it has lots of interesting information about the fast food industry that might effect your desire for their food.
Of course there is also Super Size Me the movie about the guy who ate nothing but McDonald's for a month & the effects on his body. I haven't seen it yet (I'm waiting to finish "Fast Food Nation" first) but I hear it's good.
Some time ago, there was a similar deal with the iTunes music service. See here.
do feature a pedometer. So after you stumble to the emergency room during the major cardiac infarction, the coroner will eventually be able to tell how many steps you walked before your untimely demise.
..how long will it be, before McDonald's is accused of fattening people by luring them with music then?
http://efil.blogspot.com/
In what dimension do Slashdotters care about counting calories? I'd have thought that the discussion would be about how to circumvent the Sony DRM. or building a beowulf cluster of McDonalds pedometers -- something more befitting of this community.
Be proud of the ketchup stains on your t-shirt, goddammit!
"I usually like mine with an angioplasty."
maybe they'll be adding a tie-in with Dance Dance Revolution for the Playstation 2, for the Adult Happy Meals? That would counteract the calories a little better.
I wish everyone would quit their bitching about how unhealthy McDonalds is. I don't mean to be a defender of bad food, in fact, I'm a vegetarian and eat at McDonalds once or twice a year, but it's not like McDonalds ever pretended that their food was healthy. If the American public is too retarded to tell that eating a jucy burger, deep FAT fried french fries, and a calorie-sugar-caffene laden soda isn't good for them, the maybe they deserve to have their arteries clogged.
Sure, it's a bit sad that they market their product so strongly to children - but adults have no reason to complain. If you don't want horribly unhealthy food, don't eat there - or at least get one of their moderately healthy parfaits or salads or the new veggie burger.
The only thing that really pisses me off about McDonalds is that when they finally started making a Veggie Burger, they made it taste like shit. There's lots of veggie burgers out there that taste great, but McDonalds had to make one that could never compete in taste with their real meat patties.
This is Andrew Q Ranter, signing off.
Mod my comments down. It'll be fun.
what size server farm will be able to live up to their "Over a Billion Served" claim.
come on fhqwhgads
Why are people so worked up about McDonald's food these days? It's never been a big secret that fast food isn't healthy. After all, it's called Junk Food for a reason. Heck, McDonald's has had nutritional information posted in their restaurants for twenty years. (And it's on their website too.) Anybody who cares the slightest about what they eat has all the information they need to make an informed decision. McDonald's doesn't hold a gun to your head and make you buy/eat their food. It's not addictive. If they want to gorge and eat an UltraMegaSized Triple Big Mac with extra mayo, why should you care?
If you don't like the food at McDonald's, buy your food somewhere else. Is it too much to ask people to accept some personal responsibility for their lifestyle choices?
It's thousand island dressing. With a little tiny amount of extra pickle in it.
;-)
"'Cause Knowledge is power!"
- Give a man a fire and he's warm for a day, but set him on fire and he's warm for the rest of his life.
You forgot to factor in what scientists and dieticians like to refer to as the BAAM factor (not to be confused with Emeril's BAM!). Which many believe is McDonalds way to actually decrease the weight of their customers, a diet of sorts.
BAAM is expanded as Barf At Abhorrent Music, which would not only eliminate the 600 Big Mac calories, but whatever else that had not yet been digested. Depending on which Pop band's CD you buy, you can actually end up at negative calories for the day.
And, BTW, a big mac extra value meal is probably closer to 1000-1500 calories depending on the drink. For those that don't know, that supplies at least 75% of the calories that many of us need for the entire day, as well as most of the fat. However, it supplies much less than 50% many other nutrients.
"She's a scientist and a lesbian. She's not going to let it slide." Orphan Black
This is only continuation of their great symbiosis. Even recently, if you do not feel very well after going to McDonalds, you can not be sure it was caused by BigMac or Britney you were feed with during the visit.
Why waste time at Mc Donald's when there are tons of free websites giving the music away for free anyways. For instance http://www.myglobalsound.com has new free music for download every month. I mean Pepsi did it with Apple and they did it right way the first time. In my opinion this Mc Donald's and Sony deal is just not going to work out as expected. I'm not going to buy a big just cause I want free song. Having to collected piece to go to a website and use is no good. The best way is like Apple and Pepsi did it you either win or lose instantly.
Excessive consumption of fast food IS the enemy. It is easy to blame people health problems on fast food companies but when it comes down to it, the problem is really with the mental state of people today. We want everything right now, and we want LOTS of it. If everyone ate fast food in moderation and got some exercise there wouldnt be any problem. The same goes with drinking, drugs, partying, eating OTHER food, sex, porn.. etc etc etc... Its all too east to OVERindulge in something that has the perceived benefit of being fast, or makes you feel good. There is a healthy balance, and once people figure this out there wont be a problem anymore. But we dont have to worry about that happening anytime soon. I personally think we should worry about cutting down on people smoking. More people die annually because of smoking then they do of obiesity. If we can get people to give up smoking, which people have been doing for ages, it should be easy enough to get people to realize the dangers of eating fast foor every day.
No, but the bigger ass comes free.
ad logicam Claiming a proposition is false because it was presented as the conclusion of a fallacious argument.
When going to the download section of the site, I just get a message saying something like "You need to run Windows 98SE or higher, we have no intention on making this work on other OS's so screw you". But I'm running Linux, which is definitely higher than Windows 98SE!
Meh.
The artist who wrote, performed, recorded, published, and promoted the music will get a coupon for a free super size upgrade.
I haven't seen it yet (I'm waiting to finish "Fast Food Nation" first) but I hear it's good.
It's very funny and well made, but his point utterly fails. First off, he does something inordinately stupid.. he comes up with "rules" that virtually guarantee he'll eat the biggest, most fattening thing that they offer. And then when he becomes sick, he expects you to have not expected this in the first place.
This is one of those "well, duh" moments. It's like when researchers announce that they've done some 3 years of studies and found that kids don't like to go to school. Well, duh.
If you eat nasty fattening shit all day, every day, you won't be healthy. If you override your body's desires for foods that it needs with some arbitrary set of rules, you won't be healthy.
Health isn't a matter of what kind of foods you eat. Not really. Health is a matter of balance. Sometimes you need fat in your meal. Other times you need salad. If you eat the same damn thing all the time, it doesn't matter *what* it is, you're not eating healthy by definition.
He's trying to make a point that this food is unhealthy. In this, he fails miserably. The food is not unhealthy. His behavior in eating nothing but that food is unhealthy. If he wanted to prove that any particular chain was unhealthy, he should have tried to eat a balanced diet using only foods from that chain. They have a big menu for a friggin' reason. They do offer salads. They do offer healthy choices (admittedly, not many). Just because they offer a lot of fatty foods doesn't mean you have to eat nothing but those fatty foods.
So the movie, while funny, utterly fails to make any commentary that has any real meaning. It's a mockumentary at best. He didn't actually prove anything that anybody wouldn't have known from hearing the premise. "Well, duh."
- Give a man a fire and he's warm for a day, but set him on fire and he's warm for the rest of his life.
Wouldn't it have done you more good to run back to the place?
I'm probably at the karma cap. Mod up a funny troll instead, it lightens the mood
1 cup of lard is 1850 calories, so you'd only have to eat 3.89 cups (.9208 litres) of yummy yummy lard, less depending on how many cokes you wash it down with.
Getting hungry just thinking about it. Wonder if I can get McDonalds to offer a McLard combo, with a side of extra lard. That would definitely get me the "McLardass of the Year" trophy.
ad logicam Claiming a proposition is false because it was presented as the conclusion of a fallacious argument.
I keep seeing that commercial for the new happy meal with the "step counter" in it and that stupid woman walking up the steps while her friend takes the elevator.
Like we're supposed to believe that just because McDonald's gave her a stupid step counter, that she's not going to be lazy and take the elevator.
Come on... you know she took the elevator.
But which will kill you first -- the food, or the music?
Set aside the sucky iTunes song quality, and the fact they screw over musicians. , and setting aside that Fatty Fast foods are addicting, and bad for you. The cost of a Big Mac is in upwards of 3 dollars, and one song on iTunes is $1.00. Why not buy two songs from iTunes, and go buy a hot dog from a hot dog stand.
What's another word for Thesaurus?
-Steve Wright
I really don't think anyone is eating healthier or dieting... Take a look around, America is still a pretty fat place. The recent jazz about the Atkins diet is just that; jazz. Diets like that have no lasting effects because people do not learn the CONCEPTS before they implement. They hear "Atkins sez: Don't eat bread, eat meat!" so they go eat 2 lbs of ground beef wrapped in cheese and covered with bacon. "It's cool", they say. "...No BREAD!".
I was a vegetarian for about 4 years of my life, and it made me much more selective and concious of what I was eating, and thus I lost a considerable amount of weight and became more aware of my body's needs calorically, etc. Then, about 2 years ago, I went back to eating meat, and ballooned up at least 20 pounds. Why? Because it just became food food food all over again. Burgers, steaks, whatever. Much like you stated with the common American food consumption mentality, you get in a mindset where it becomes so hard to moderate yourself, you really lose a grip on your food intake and just go hog wild. Even an INCREDIBLY active person can not sucessfully maintain a healthy body if they were to participate in the diet of "fat" Americans.
I went back to being a vegetarian about 3 months ago and have also gotten my ass on a treadmill, and I'm starting to shed off those pounds I gained from when I started eating meat again. I'm not advocating that vegetarianism is the means to lose weight here. Rather, I'm just stating that personally, for me, being a vegetarian puts me in a mindset where I'm just so much more concious of what I'm eating that I see HOW BAD most food sold in America really is. And the sad thing is, it seems people aren't necessarily always living to eat rather than eating to live, but they just can't get a decent healthy meal anywhere else.
--
Is it me, or did it just get fatter in here?
Didn't apple deny a rumor about McDonalds using their site around the time they signed the pepsi deal? Interesting. I guess McDonalds really was shopping for a music service promo. Too bad, it would have been cool to get iTunes on your BigMac (Sorry that was bad but had to be said)
I tried for 5 years to come up with a clever sig...only to realize that I am not clever.
You are right-- in the USA's culture of convenience, "Fast Food Nation" is essential reading. For those who think it is just about the ingredients (yes, there is shit in the beef), you are missing 90% of the issue. Go spend a few bucks on the book-- it will open your eyes to the incredible influence of the fast food industry. All of which is entirely funded by the one in four Americans who eats fast food everyday without giving it a second thought.
I think I spent maybe $6.50 on this book at Costco. I have gained priceless insight on a very mundane part of everyday life, and have made much better decisions about since then.
As I read the book (I have a second or later edition, with updates), I noted the omission of comments about In-N-Out Burger. At the end of the book, Schlosser mentions how In-N-Out Burger is completely unlike all of the other fast food chains, especially with regards to the food itself.
This was particularly pleasing to me, as I have always thought that In-N-Out Burger is *so much* better than any other fast food hamburger, and their fries are fantastic, too. Every time I have visited there has always been a long line, but the wait is short, and the food is absolutely worth it-- regular, or "animal style".
I so wish they would expand their business eastward. They would destroy Whataburger (sawdust buger, methinks. even the chicken) and even Sonic here in San Antonio.
BTW-- even back in 1999 I recall seeing signs that they were hiring new employees in Gilroy near the outlet shopping center at over $11/hour.
Except that they call their pedometer a 'stepometer'.
God I hate it how they dumb things down for Americans.
.noitacidem deen uoy siht daer nac uoy fI
Does anyone here remember when a guy at Wired (I think) registered the mcdondonals.com domain for himself. He called up McDonalds and offered it to them. They said they had never heard of the internet and had no idea why they would ever want to be on it. This was back in 1994, I think.
pop music has been placed in the same class as a side of fries.
"If any question why we died, Tell them because our fathers lied."
Two of my great joys in life are putting a CD on for the first time and discover that it's a fantastic piece of music and having a good meal in a restaurant I've tried for the first time. The fun in both of these activities is increased by a degree of exploration - either trawling through Internet music sites and music shop displays or driving around in an unknown area to find a good-looking place to eat.
I'm not into fast food particularly or music downloads (music for me is about full albums, not single tracks) but I have no issue with McDonalds selling fast food or Sony/iTunes/etc. selling downloadable music, if that's what people want.
I do have a problem with the modern general populace, however. Many people today, especially the youth generation, seem to want to live in this constant "safe zone" of life - at least here in the UK, they want the same theme pubs, fast food joints and bland popular music. In all three cases, they are assured of knowing "exactly what they are getting" beforehand without any risk of paying for something they may not think is worth the money. They rely on "product branding" to keep them from taking any risks in life and, to me, seem to live in fear of the unknown because standing out from the crowd would not be "cool".
I don't claim to understand their motivations and when I was their age, I had many of the same traits. I therefore hope they learn, like I did, to develop the confidence in their own decision making and to not give a damn about what "everyone else" is doing and make their own decisions.
In the meantime, just how many musicians and chefs are there out there who, because they are not a mainstream "branded product", have not had the opportunity to play us their music or cook us a meal?
Gentoo Linux - another day, another USE flag.
the SuperSize Me guy must be ticked... he coulda at least got some song downloads for all his trouble/liver damage =)
e.
Build Your Own PVR/HTPC news, reviews, &
Or do you want to come over to my house for a home-cooked chilli, a few beers and some classic rock music cranked up to full volume on my hi-fi?
Enough said...
Gentoo Linux - another day, another USE flag.
The average north american likes mcdonalds. No one knows why. Despite the low quality of food and the fact that just sitting in a mcdonalds, you are getting second hand fat, people still eat there. Maybe it's just the way we where brough up.
But people also like pretebding they are healthy. How many people order diet pop with their quarter pounder. Now salad is just another excuse for people to eat at McDonalds and convince themselves they are healthy. Or even better, atkins burgers (that's right, if you order the same burger, but no bread, you are healthy... umm... NO!)
Salad at McDonalds is just part of the 'i want to get healthy but don't want to do anythign to do it' mentality that's so prevelant in north america and gives birth to dumb ideas like the atkins diet (i mean, who follows the diet of a guy who died of obesity...)
The Neo-Bohemian Techno-Socialist
They're not dumbing it down - it's not a full fledged pedometer. A real pedometer allows you to calibrate it, and will estimate the distance that you've walked, calories that you've burned, and other useful information. The 'stepometer' they're giving out only counts steps, and doesn't give you any other information.
Information doesn't want to be anthropomorphized. -AC
Here's an idea: Go to McCorporate, purchase a couple dozen (or hundered, depending on your choice/desire of music) of the meals, but not for yourself. Have the meals donated to some hunger program, keep the free songs for yourself. You get the music, and you can write off the purchase of the McMeals as a tax exemption or whatever.
/eats a Double Cheese a day, has stayed at a constant weight (don't know if I can say the same about cholesterol)
While many people may not enjoy the thought of eating at McDonald's, I'm sure that quite a few homeless/poor people would be overjoyed at the thought of a full meal for free, regardless of the grease (homeless people don't care about carbs.) You get the music, they get the food, everyone's happy. Oh, and you get a tax exemption.
Just something that came to my mind, I wouldn't actually do this. [no money]
Notes:
Do not use SonicStage while logged on to a domain user account under Windows 2000
Professional, Windows XP Professional or Windows XP Home Edition.
SonicStage should be installed while logged on to an account with administrator privileges.
It's not easy to show that much technical incompetence in such few words.
OS Reviews: Free and Open Source Software
I just checked a bottle of coke in the office fridge. It's 300 calories for 24oz. That's 12.5 calories per oz.
Now, a large Coke from McDonalds is 32oz, making it 400 calories even.
Big Mac meal, supersized is:
Big Mac: 600
Large Coke: 310 (from McDonald's site, because of ice?)
Large Fry: 520
Total: 1410 calories.
Someone mentioned a cup of lard is 1850 calories. Only 140 calories more then a supersized #1. Add a 12oz orange juice and it's even.
Stats (not for the faint of heart)
"That's so plausible, I can't believe it!" - Leela
Umm, so you're saying McDonald's food IS healthy?
No, I'm not. Obviously you can only grasp binary concepts, however the real world is not black and white.
Food is just food. There's nothing inherently healthy or unhealthy about any particular food. It's silly to state that this or that food is unhealthy because that's oversimplifing the situation.
The reality of the matter is that what's healthy or unhealthy, at any given moment, depends on the individual and their current dietary needs. Charactizing any particular food as healthy or unhealthy is meaningless without considering the current, changing from moment to moment, needs of the individual consuming the food in question.
- Give a man a fire and he's warm for a day, but set him on fire and he's warm for the rest of his life.